KONSHUU|Volume 49, Issue 1
2018: A YEAR IN PERSPECTIVE Bogeun choi
EDITOR IN CHIEF
4th year, applied math and data science Cover picture = my favorite anime of 2018
Ah, 2018. One thing is for certain -- it was certainly a year. In all seriousness, 2018 was a great year. Anime-wise, I mean. As with every year, new anime come out and although 95% of them are complete garbage, there’s the 5% that become beloved classics talked about for years. When it was decided that the first issue of the new semester would be dedicated to the best of 2018, I racked my brain for ideas on what to write about anime-wise. After deliberating for a painstaking 37 seconds, I came to the only conclusion: why not write about all the great anime of 2018? Subjectively speaking, of course. Admittedly, I didn’t watch a lot of the “great” anime from this year. In fact, I didn’t watch much anime in general. 2018 marked the first time where I watched a single digit amount of airing shows per season. Which, looking back, was pretty inevitable given my busy college schedule and the fact that a lot of seasonal anime suck.
We start with the first season of the year: Winter 2018. With anime such as Slow Start, Mitsuboshi Colors, and Gakuen Babysitters, it was heaven for moe lovers (e.g. me) and hell for everybody else (e.g. everybody else). Out of all the moe though, two contenders stood out, and they are Yuru Camp and Sora yori mo Tooi Basho (A Place Further Than the Universe, Yorimoi). Both cemented themselves as must-watches in the genre in different ways. Yuru Camp took a more traditional approach with the idea that cute girls + random other thing = PROFIT. Unlike most anime that follow this, however, Yuru Camp was able to attract a more general otaku audience thanks to its comedy, fun characters, great backgrounds, and general comfy atmosphere. On the other hand, Yorimoi may not even be considered a moe anime. Sure, there are girls as protagonists, but it doesn’t have many of the characteristics that make a moe anime… moe. Instead, it’s an inspiring tale of finding yourself and achieving your goals packed with emotion. Or so I’ve been told: I stopped after episode 4 because I wasn’t a big fan of the characters and the whole concept felt super cheesy to me. Though considering many people consider it their favorite anime of the year, and the New York Times even went as far as to put it in their list of Best TV Shows of 2018 (granted, the international list), I might just be a big fat idiot. Other personal favorites from this season include Violet Evergarden (amazing animation), Pop Team Epic (How to Make a Meme Anime), and Koi wa Ameagari no You ni/After the Rain (beautifully crafted story from a questionable plotline). Oh, and you may have heard of Darling in the FranXX, which ended up being a cautionary tale of hype and collaboration.
Example #1 of Trashy seasonal anime
The goal of this is to highlight the best and most notable anime of the year. Hopefully there are some anime I talk about here that you didn’t know about, ones that slipped under the radar. Who knows, maybe a new favorite could be found. Let’s get into it to see.
Now we move on to Spring 2018, the season of sequels. If you were a new anime fan, this was not the season to start watching. With heavy hitters such as Boku no Hero Academia, Steins;Gate, Tokyo Ghoul, and Shokugeki no Soma all having sequels, it was tough times for the originals. Yet as they say, life… finds a way. Except replace life with anime. Yes, despite the sequel-mania, there were still some great original anime that rivaled the sequels in popularity. Some of the biggest include Megalo Box (spiritual successor to Ashita no Joe), Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii (adult romantic comedy between otaku), and Hinamatsuri (absurdist humor with hilarious characters). I personally enjoyed the two that I
